HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - It was more than an hour before kickoff, and even then Luana Lee was a nervous wreck. She'd spend the next four hours pacing, worrying, almost sick.

Her son is Alabama A&M's quarterback, Jaymason Lee, the starter in Saturday's 12-10 Alabama A&M win over Texas Southern. Luanna's only consolation against the violence of football: "It's better than boxing," she said.

Luana Lee has flown in Honolulu to watch Jaymason, along with four other family members, his paternal grandfather Sydney Lee, his maternal grandparents and uncle, Patricia and Stanley Sr. and Stanley Jr. Uyemura. They'll be here all this week, sticking around for the Oct. 5 game against Mississippi Valley State. Three other family members, including Jaymason's dad Jarrod, arrive Monday.

The fivesome left Honolulu on red-eye flight at 5 p.m. local time on Thursday, made connections in Dallas with a three-hour layover, then landed in Huntsville a little before 11 a.m. Friday - 6 a.m. in Honolulu.

"It's worth it," she said.

This is her first time to see Jaymason play as an NCAA FCS division quarterback. The family watched him play juco ball in Arizona last fall.

She's already restless and the thought of her son playing almost brings tears to her eyes.

"I'm really nervous," she said, clutching a stadium blanket and wearing one of a set of identical T-shirts with "Alabama A&M" and the numeral 10 on the front, an image of Jaymason superimposed against the Hawaiian flag on the back. "I pace. I get sick. I get really queasy and nauseous and nervous.

"But," she added, "it's fun."

Luana was in Huntsville in May, helping her son move into his apartment. She's grown fond of the place.

"It's like home. It's exactly like home. These are beautiful people," Luana said, somehow missing the fact the nearest beach is 350 miles away. "That's the only thing," she concurred, when the beach is mentioned. "There's no beach. And there's no fresh fish. But other than that the weather is exactly the same, down to the humidity. The people are really, really nice."

Lee's evening made boxing look tame. A couple of shots he took, he seemed ready for a toe-tag. One last blow in the fourth was a TKO. He left after completing 9-of-23 passes, with three dropped.

"I've got to complete more passes," he said.

"He came in there and showed good leadership and battled hard," said tackle Alan Cruz.

As sore as Lee was at game's end, "I did OK," Luana reported. "I got some mileage on my shoes."

Lee is product of several cultures, Hawaiian, Caucausian, Korean and Japanese. He has an elaborate Polynesian tattoo that pays tribute to his family, including the faces of his mother and father on his arm. His full name is Jaymason Dale Leikaimana Lee. The third name is a traditional name that he shares with his grandfather and father, which by tradition must be formally requested by the mother.